Yesterday the California Attorney General's office responded to an August 21 letter from the Transbay Joint Powers Authority. The TJPA letter argued that it is "legally improper" for the CHSRA to study any alternatives to the Transbay Terminal as the San Francisco terminus. Deputy AG Christine Sproul, writing on behalf of AG Jerry Brown, explained the AG office's position that CHSRA is entirely correct to study other alternatives. The letter is reproduced below:
Deputy AG Transbay Letter to CHSRA ED 91709
I have to run and catch a train here in Sacramento, but I wanted to get this up there for everyone on the blog to read and react to. Obviously this means the dispute between CHSRA and TJPA is not going away anytime soon. I continue to believe that political leadership, particularly from San Francisco's powerful federal representatives, is desperately needed to bring CHSRA and TJPA to the table to develop a workable solution.
Friday, September 18, 2009
Deputy AG Letter Supports CHSRA's Transbay Position
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208 comments:
«Oldest ‹Older 201 – 208 of 208Anon,
Yes, I am aware of what Kopp or Diridon said about 4th & King... however, I interpreted that as politicking to bring attention to the TBT and nothing more.
The fact is, 4th & King does not satisfy the letter of the law; AB 3034 or 1A. It is explicitly cited in AB 3034.
The site that the Authority is having studied is adjoining the TBT... and satisfies AB 3034 if they put the terminals there.
The program level EIR chose Pacheco; no further study of Altamont will be done; the program level has excluded that route.
You don't get it. The program level EIR can't have excluded alternatives other than the TTC because the program level EIR didn't look at station placement alternatives.
The program level EIR researched Altamont and properly excluded it.
The project level EIR will choose an alternative for the SF terminus.
@Dan:
US Army Garrison Livorno at Camp Darby.
Stationed is not the right word, vacationed is more appropriate.
lyqwyd said...
"@rafael
Yeah, I read that two, but it's still not clear to me that phase 1 cost of $1.2 billion includes the train box."
Yes, its very much a matter of "which phase 1". The train box was originally included in Phase 1, then they didn't have the money for it and it was removed (partly because of the postponing of a 2006 HSR proposition, so it seems they have been planning to raid HSR funds to build the Caltrain station for a while now), and now they hope they can get the money and want to plop it back in.
Anonymous said...
"@Brandon and Duncan:
The whole pitch that Diridon and others, including Domonic Stheling, top dog on the EIR for the Bay area, is:
The program level EIR chose Pacheco; no further study of Altamont will be done; the program level has excluded that route."
Quite so, however, the project level has to decide whether there will be Peninsula station at Menlo Park or Atherton or Palo Alto or perhaps someplace that actually wants the HSR station. That would be at the project level - obviously you cannot finalize the choice of station location until you have first finalized the corridor that will be used.
"Kopp, says many times 4th and King is far enough --- now says Beale street shouuld be studied."
Another example of a project level decision rather than a program level decision. Of course, whether what Kopp says ABOUT 4th and King being OK is in fact correct is debatable unless it goes to court and a case is decide yes or not - but clearly whether the train station is in the basement of the TBT or across the street, with, say, a people mover connecting the mezzanine to the HSR/Caltrain train station on one side and the BART at the other - that's a project level decision.
That's why the TJPA is trying to get things locked in with their funding application - if they can not get money of their own now, they are negotiating from a weak position.
BruceMcF said:
Yes, its very much a matter of "which phase 1". The train box was originally included in Phase 1, then they didn't have the money for it and it was removed (partly because of the postponing of a 2006 HSR proposition, so it seems they have been planning to raid HSR funds to build the Caltrain station for a while now), and now they hope they can get the money and want to plop it back in.
Imagine that! "Raiding" HSR funds to...(wait for it)...build a HSR station and connecting tunnel. How dare they! Those cooky SF libruls.
+++++++
@ Liquid, yes the $1.2 billion estimate for phase 1 of the TTC is for the building and the foundations (essentially everything except rail). Phase 2 is the tunnel and the below ground station (essentially only rail-related stuff). One of the reasons the TJPA divided up the two phases by mode (rail vs. bus) was to align funding sources with what they are paying for.
However, due to engineering issues, it makes sense to at least excavate and prepare the train box before building a massive high rise over it, since doing the train box afterwards will be much more difficult and expensive.
The TJPA has been trying to identify funding for the train box in order to move it back to Phase 1. The ARRA stimulus funds are seen as the most viable source of funding for the train box at this point, which brings us to where we are now. :)
As a train-rider and SF resident, all I know is that rail at the new TTC would be brilliant, but if it never happens, then so be it. I lay the blame mostly with the CHSRA considering that the effort to bring rail to downtown SF has been aroudn for the CHSRA's entire existence and it wasn't until after Prop 1a passed that Kopp revealed that he had no intention of working with SF to fulfill this long-standing goal. What an ass.
spence: ""Raiding" HSR funds to...(wait for it)...build a HSR station and connecting tunnel. How dare they! Those cooky SF libruls."
If they were willing to do that, there'd be no controversy. Indeed, that is the simplest way to resolve the controversy - if they would agree to build an HSR tunnel and station.
What they are trying to do at the moment is to raid HSR funds to build a Caltrain station and connecting tunnel while calling it an HSR tunnel and station.
But the throughput capacity is not high enough and the physical design does not accommodate the majority of 220mph HSR train designs in use around the world today.
TJPA is obviously trying to use political clout and corporate suit PR spin to sell a lie. They might succeed and they might fail, but if they succeed, both the State of California and the Federal Government will be on the hook for billions of dollars of unnecessary costs down the track, and getting poor performance for your and our money.
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